Baybay City to construct own sanitary landfill

BAYBAY City aims to construct its own sanitary landfill the soonest possible time as mandated under Republic Act 9003 or the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000, said Mayor Carmen Cari.

Cari said they have already allotted in their budget the construction of a sanitary landfill.

It was learned that the sanitary landfill (SLF) will be constructed in Barangay Buenavista. The site identification process was completed in 2009.

The Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB) already furnished a favorable hydro-geological assessment report for the proposed site and the local government of Baybay already purchased the 13.8-hectare lot for P9.7 million.

“We know that construction of sanitary landfill runs in the millions. But we are very much keen on constructing one,” Mayor Cari said in a recent press conference.

She likewise considered a significant growth in the number of business locators in their five-year-old city, while an increase in human workforce is seen to affect the city’s volume of garbage generated daily.

In an updated Waste Analysis and Characterization Study (WACS) of Baybay, initial results revealed that with a margin of error of 10 percent, Baybay residents generate an average of 0.52 kg/capita of waste per day; about 0.64 and 0.49 kg/capita/day are generated from urban and rural areas respectively.

Meanwhile, initiatives such as updating of WACS, partial dumpsite closure and cost-recovery mechanism have likewise been continued by the City Government even with limited resources.

The local government also pioneered the creation of committees within its Solid Waste Management Board (SWMB) to simplify policy-making activities and program implementation by the SWMB. (Leyte Samar Daily Express)